As I continue my sabermetrics and hockey posts I am looking at team Corsi ratings. This is the difference between shots directed at goal for and against in five on five situations. This is a strong indicator of puck possession for the team in question. It is a repeatable part of the success of any given team. It is not the only part of their success. Clearly goaltending, special teams and the quality of the scoring chances is not taken into account here. Nevertheless if a team has a ranking that is significantly different from their ranking in the NHL standings, unless there is a clear reason (such as goaltending) to explain it, it is quite likely that they will have a change in fortunes next season.

This is also a useful value because it is needed to make team adjustments on individual players.

Here are the 30 teams ranked by their team Corsi’s in 2011/12:

2011/12 Team Corsi Ratings

Rank

Team

Corsi

1

Detroit Red Wings

+648

2

Pittsburgh Penguins

+644

3

Los Angeles Kings

+636

4

Boston Bruins

+547

5

Chicago Blackhawks

+412

6

Vancouver Canucks

+361

7

Ottawa Senators

+360

8

San Jose Sharks

+313

9

St Louis Blues

+264

10

Colorado Avalanche

+221

11

Philadelphia Flyers

+172

12

Winnipeg Jets

+59

13

New Jersey Devils

-23

14

Phoenix Coyotes

-28

15

Dallas Stars

-51

16

Florida Panthers

-89

17

Buffalo Sabres

-140

18

Toronto Maple Leafs

-163

19

Washington Capitals

-177

20

Nashville Predators

-186

21

Montreal Canadiens

-258

22

Carolina Hurricanes

-280

23

Anaheim Ducks

-286

24

Columbus Blue Jackets

-306

25

New York Rangers

-334

26

New York Islanders

-351

27

Calgary Flames

-386

28

Edmonton Oilers

-387

29

Tampa Bay Lightning

-391

30

Minnesota Wild

-802

Three teams are at the top of the league with very similar rankings. They are the Detroit Red Wings, Pittsburgh Penguins and Los Angeles Kings. This number shows us that Los Angeles’s Stanley Cup victory was not a complete surprise. They were a better team in the regular season than their point total suggested.

Behind them come Chicago and Boston who are both recent Stanley Cup winners.

The Presidents Trophy winning Vancouver Canucks narrowly beat out the rising Ottawa Senators for the next position.

San Jose and St Louis are next up. They are followed by Colorado, who is the top ranked team by Corsi that missed the playoffs.

Philadelphia is next in 11th place. They are followed by Winnipeg, who is the final positively ranked team.

New Jersey and Phoenix are next. They had good playoff runs but were not particularly successful in terms of puck possession in the regular season.

Dallas and Florida are next. They are followed by Buffalo and Toronto.

The Washington Capitals come next. This is a team that has done quite well in terms of puck possession in the past but struggled under Dale Hunter. I expect they bounce back both in Corsi and in the standings under Adam Oates.

Nashville is next. They have succeeded largely on the strength of goaltending and defence and not so much in terms of puck possession. It will be interesting to see how important Ryan Suter was to that success.

Montreal, Carolina and Anaheim are next. They are followed by Columbus who had horrible goaltending while finishing last in the NHL. Even with better goaltending the Blue Jackets are not a particularly good team.

The New York Rangers did quite well in the regular season despite a poor Corsi. A large part of that credit goes to the goaltending of Vezina Trophy winner Henrik Lundqvist, but I think their regular season is not repeatable.

The New York Islanders, Calgary Flames and Edmonton Oilers are the next poor performers.

Tampa Bay is next. They had some top scorers in Steve Stamkos and Martin St Louis but awful defence kept their opponents in control of the puck most of the time

Minnesota is the league worst team by a significant margin. They added Zach Parise and Ryan Suter as free agents. Will that be enough to turn this team around?